


summer homework

by amuk



Category: Fruits Basket, Fruits Basket (Anime 2001), Fruits Basket (Anime 2019), Fruits Basket - Takaya Natsuki (Manga)
Genre: Boredom, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, High School, Homework, Humor, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:28:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26571427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amuk/pseuds/amuk
Summary: Uotani was a moron who was friends with morons. They were never going to get their summer homework done.
Relationships: Hanajima Saki & Honda Tohru, Hanajima Saki & Honda Tohru & Uotani Arisa, Hanajima Saki & Uotani Arisa, Honda Tohru & Uotani Arisa
Comments: 7
Kudos: 15





	summer homework

**Author's Note:**

> For the Furuba zine. This is uh, a little old, and I’m not sure how I feel about it anymore, but I love writing these three together. And I want them to all live together post-series, even if only for a little bit.

“Arrrrgghhhhh,” Uotani moaned, pillowing her head in her arms. She leaned on the low wooden table, shoving the textbooks aside to make room. Pressing her skin to the cool surface, she asked, “It’s summer, isn’t it? The time when we’re supposed to be at the beach or in a pool or outside?”

“I think so,” Tohru confirmed eagerly. Uotani could almost hear the cogs in her head churning, a mental checklist run through. Something like: it was sunny, check. It was hot, check. The skies were clear, check. Her head turned every which way, from the window to the door to Uotani to their clothes. Finished, she announced triumphantly with a fist pump, “It’s definitely summer!”

Hopefully somewhere on that list was a fan. Uotani was practically dying, her shirt drenched with sweat, because a certain, stupid red-head had broken the AC. As fun as it was watching Kyo and Yuki go at it, she wished it didn’t have any consequences for her. She was a bystander! Let her bystand in peace!

“I am feeling some heat,” Hanajima concurred demurely, her voice soft and low.

At that, Uotani peeked out her interlaced arms. Dressed in a pitch-black dress with a pitch black shawl, Hanajima looked like the embodiment of winter, rather than summer. No, to be frank, she looked like the embodiment of death. As usual. Her delicate fingernails, coated in black nail polish, gently nudged Tohru’s face to one side so she could finish her latest masterpiece. Half of Tohru’s hair was a series mini braids and Uotani wasn’t sure what the end result would be. Dryly, she asked, “Really?”

“Really,” Hanajima confirmed, not a trace of irony in her voice. Her left hand tugged the shawl slightly, baring her neck. She fanned it lightly. “Truly, it is summer.”

“I have no idea how you do that. Or can even say that with a straight face.” Not sure if she should be awed or worried, Uotani shrugged. It wasn’t worth debating over. She had long ago learned there was no point in questioning Hanajima and her ways. The supernatural was the easiest explanation and she stuck with it. Unfolding an arm, she rested her cheek on the other one as she eyed the table. Two textbooks were open, math diagrams taking up the majority of the pages. Several papers were scattered on the table. She gingerly picked up her work sheet, pinching it between two fingers as she stared at it disdainfully. A whole morning of homework and all she’d really got accomplished was a doodle of a bowl of ramen. God she was hungry. “We need to shred these. Or maybe we can have a dog eat it. There’s one here, right?”

“N-n-n-no,” Tohru shook her head so fast, it looked like it would spin off her head. “No dogs. Not a single one. No animals either. Nope. Not at all.”

“Burn them,” Hanajima suggested, her lips curving up into a slight smile.

“The animals?” Tohru yelped fearfully, her hands covering her cheeks. “Y-you can’t do that!”

“I thought there were no animals?” Uotani rolled her eyes. It was like this every time they came for a visit. She wasn’t exactly sure what secret the Sohmas’ were keeping, but it seemed to involve owning an illegal menagerie. Or maybe Tohru was; she was soft-hearted like that. Maybe she was hiding stray pets in her closet, feeding them when no one was looking.

“That’s right!” Tohru slammed her fist into her open hand, looking like she’d just realized something. “There are no animals. So you can’t burn them.”

“Not the cat, dog, or rat,” Hanajima smiled sweetly, ignoring Tohru’s quiet gasp at each word on the list. “Burn our homework.” Her eyes and voice remained at a deadpan, making it hard to tell how serious she was. “You can start with mine.”

Knowing laziness, she was probably dead serious. Horrified, Tohru tried to turn to Hanajima, stuttering, “F-f-fire?”

Hanajima sternly wrapped her hands around her face, turning her back to the front. “I’m not done,” she admonished, selecting the next strands to weave into a braid.

This did little to assuage Tohru’s concern and she stared at Uotani fearfully. “Uo-chan?”

“It sounds like a good idea.” Curious, Uotani picked up Hanajima’s sheet. Her name was written beautifully on the top, elegant strokes to make the kanji of her name. The rest of the sheet was left a pristine white, not a single pencil mark on a single question. Not even the easy ones, the ones that Uotani herself managed to scrounge up an answer for. “You didn’t even try.”

“It makes it easier to burn.” Hanajima smiled serenely. “And I didn’t waste a single pencil.”

“I’m not sure that’s something to be proud of.” Uotani sighed, glancing at her friend. How she made it into high school was a mystery. Did she study the precise minimal amount required? Use her waves to sense the right answer? Or something else entirely? Still, a fire sounded fun. “Maybe we can have smores later, use this to make a big bonfire.”

“We c-c-can’t burn it!” Flustered, Tohru waved her hands rapidly in front of her. Her eyes darted around the room in a panic, her face flushed red. “We have to do our homework! The teacher’ll be sad!”

Breaking into a laugh, Uotani dropped the paper. Sometimes it was too easy to tease Tohru. Cradling her chin her hands, she grinned mischievously at her friend. “Don’t worry, I promise to leave yours alone.”

“That’s good…” Tohru sighed with relief for a moment before realizing the implication. In a moment of desperation, she tumbled out of her seat, yanking her hair out of Hanajima’s hands. Crawling quickly to Uotani, she grabbed the paper out of her hand. “No, you can’t burn yours either!”

Uotani covered her mouth as she snorted. Maybe she was a little too mean. “Alright, alright, we won’t do that either.”

“Promise?” Tohru asked doubtfully, no longer trusting her.

Hands up, Uotani nodded her defeat. “Promise.”

Tohru’s eyes narrowed. Scrutinizing her friend for a long minute, she sank to her knees with a smile. “Phew. That’s good.”

As Tohru started organizing the papers, gathering them into one large pile, Hanajima got up. “I didn’t make a promise.”

The papers fell out of Tohru’s hands. Slack-jawed, she stared at her. “What?”

“But I won’t burn it as well.” Hanajima sat down next to Tohru, folding her legs neatly beneath her. Flipping her hair over her shoulder, she added, “Not this time.”

“Oh. Good.” Worn out, Tohru’s shoulders slumped and she rested her head on Hanajima’s shoulders. She closed her eyes, leaning into Hanajima’s touch as she tenderly patted Tohru’s head. “I’ll help you.”

“…I think you missed an important line there.” Uotani raised a brow at Tohru’s content face, not sure how she missed the _not this time_ part. Rolling her eyes, she moved on. What homework did they have left to finish? The closest sheet was math and Uotani scowled as she scanned it. “This is so frickin’ useless. I’m never going to need this.”

“Maybe in university?” Tohru suggested, sitting straight now. Picking up a different homework assignment, she stared determinedly at the sheet. Uotani could make out a few chemistry symbols on the back—H20 was water, right? “I think Yuki said that it would be useful there.”

“With my brains?” Uotani snorted at the idea, at the improbability of it all. She could just picture it, a yankee girl in a room full of straight-laced honour students. Maybe she’d make it in, but lasting longer than that? “Not gonna happen. Can you just imagine it? I’d get thrown out after a day.”

“You can’t think that way, Uo-chan!” Tohru refuted, her expression cross. She glared at Uotani, her fingers crinkling the paper. “You’d last more than a day! A week even!”

Uotani blinked. Processing it, she shook her head wryly. “So I’ll get kicked out either way?” Taking the paper out of Tohru’s grip, she smoothened it out on the table. “All that staring is just going to burn a hole in the thing.”

“If I look long enough, the answers might appear,” Tohru suggested hopefully, her hands clasped in front of her chest as though she were praying to a science god. Or maybe just a homework god. Uotani would take a math god, if she could.

“You’ve been spending too much time with the Sohmas’. At least, the idiotic ones.” Uotani flopped on the ground, staring at the ceiling. Man, she couldn’t wait to graduate. At least then there’d be no homework. Lowering her eyes to Tohru, she asked, “You’re going to university?”

For a moment, Tohru sat straight, her hand pumped up and ready for whatever speech she was about to give. Her mouth dropped open, she took a deep breath, and then she sighed and slumped forward. “I’ll just get a job.”

Uotani winced. Yep. That sounded about right. “Gotcha. We’re a trio of idiots. Maybe we can find a job together.”

“Oh, that sounds great!” Tohru perked up, her eyes shining at the thought. “We can work together and have lunch together.” She started counting on her fingers, excited. “And walk home together and—”

“We can do almost everything together,” Hanajima agreed, grasping Tohru’s hands gently. She squeezed once before dropping them. “Except for the work part. I will go to university.”

If Uotani had a drink, she would have choked. Actually, even breathing air, she choked. Hanajima. In university. No matter what angle she looked at it, it was impossible. “You’re going to university? What would you even do there?”

“Get my M.R.S.” Crossing her arms, Hanajima nodded seriously. “While it would be ideal to be Kyo’s mother, I want to check my options.”

“Kyo’s m-m-mother?” Tohru’s jaw dropped, her eyes as wide as dinner plates.

“Step-mother,” Hanajima corrected.

“You, stop that.” Reaching over, Uotani chopped Hanajima on the head. “Save it for when Kyo’s around.” The joke was less funny when he wasn’t there to react. At least, she hoped it was a joke. “You can barely study for a test, how’ll you pass the entrance exams?”

“That’s easy.” Hanajima picked up a pencil, one with the letters ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’, and ‘D’ at the end, and rolled it. “I just have to choose the right multiple choice answers.”

“There’s more to tests than multiple choice answers!” Uotani growled, facepalming. Still, either way, she wasn’t really too concerned about Hanajima’s future. No matter what she ended up doing, she’d probably be fine. That just left her and Tohru and whatever workplace would take in a delinquent and a saint.

“Do you think I could do that?” Tohru asked seriously, gripping the pencil tightly.

Uotani stared at her blankly. There were a few times when she wondered if she was the only one that had any common sense. “That wasn’t even a real thing.”

There was no point to her advice. Not listening, Tohru rolled the pencil herself. It rolled over the table, falling off to the side, and landing on the plush carpet. The ‘B’ landed up and she stared at it for a long minute before looking at Hanajima helplessly. “I don’t know what that means.”

“No one does,” Hanajima sympathised, patting her on the back.

“Guys! Seriously!” Uotani resisted the urge to bang her head on the wall. Judging by the clumsy plaster marks on it, someone else had already beat her to it. And to breaking the doors and windows. Actually, now that she thought about it, there were a lot of patches in the building. Sure, Kyo and Yuki fought a lot, but clearly they were worse at home than she thought. Was that a hole on the roof too? Maybe she shouldn’t let Tohru stay here after all.

“They’re like wild animals,” Hanajima muttered, reading her mind. Probably reading her mind. Uotani had never really gotten a clear answer on that one.

Tohru froze at the words. Stiffly, she stammered, “W-w-what do you mean?”

“The Sohma family.” Hanajima sighed, pointing at the patches. “They fight like wild animals.”

“Oh.” Tohru blinked once. Twice. Third time, she smiled with relief and patted her chest with an open hand. “Kyo isn’t good at fixing—you should see Yuki’s. I can barely tell there was a hole sometimes.”

“And the roof doesn’t like when it rains or anything like that?” Uotani asked, incredulous. No matter how skilled the Sohma boys were, they were still teenagers. And how the hell did a pair of teenagers break a roof? Even in her days in the gangs, she’d never heard of such a thing.

“After the first week, my room was declared a safe zone.” Tohru smiled proudly, pointing up. “They’ve always broken somewhere else.” After a moment’s thought, she stared at her door worriedly. “You don’t think they’re getting leaks?”

“A safe zone…are you in a war?” Uotani was 80% certain that this was because it was _Tohru’s_ room, more than anything else. 20% was the fact that they were terrified Hanajima would curse them if Tohru even mentioned it once. “Nah, they’ll be fine. But…you know…since it is worrying, maybe we should just live with you.”

“Huh?” Tohru stared owlishly at her, not comprehending this sudden twist.

“If we’re going to do everything together anyways—” Uotani explained, brightening at the thought.

“I’m going to university,” Hanajima reminded, returning to Tohru’s hair.

“If we’re going to do everything together anyways,” Uotani continued as though she hadn’t heard a thing. “Why not just live together too?”

“It’d be economical,” Hanajima pointed out, perhaps her only good idea of the day.

“Ohhhh!” Stars filled Tohru’s eyes and she clapped her hands together at the thought. “All of us. Living together.”

“There’s enough space here for all of us.” Uotani counted on her fingers the number of rooms she’d seen. The living room. The four bedrooms. The kitchen. The building definitely had a few rooms that weren’t used, it was fricking big. With a little bit of cleaning, they could make them livable. “We could get the boys to help clean. Kyo has to be useful at something.”

“He’s really good at moving things!” Tohru chirped, almost vibrating in her seat with excitement.

“If he complains, I’ll pummel him,” Utonai grinned. “And that perverted author would definitely be happy to have more girls here.”

“He’s very nice!” Tohru defended, though she didn’t argue about the ‘perverted’ part. “I’m sure he’ll let you stay.”

“Right. If you say so.” Uotani was pretty sure Tohru didn’t have a firm grasp on the reality of her housemates. She probably saw their fighting as nothing more than a petty squabble either. “Anyways, it’d be nice. Remember that time I stayed with you and Kyoko for a week? It’d be like that times a hundred.”

“Oh that was great!” Clapping her hands together, Tohru nodded eagerly. “You and Mom made…” Tohru’s eyes darkened, and she lowered her lids. Her hands clutched her skirt tightly. Her voice softened. “Do you think she’d be happy?”

“Happy?” Uotani asked, straining to hear her friend. She leaned closer. Already Hanajima was hugging her from behind, her arms loosely folded around Tohru’s neck as she rested her head on Tohru’s shoulder.

“That I’m not going to university?” Tohru bit her lip. Her fingers started to dig to dig into her thighs. “That I’m getting a job like her.”

“Tohru…” Not wasting a minute, Uotani grabbed Tohru’s hands and squeezed them tight. Leaning forward, she pressed her forehead against Tohru’s. “She’s definitely happy. Like, the most fricking happy mom there is. You’re graduating high school! She didn’t even get to do that.”

“I know she’s smiling at you,” Hanajima comforted her. There was something reassuring about her saying it, as though she was looking at her ghost right now and translating from the other side. “She’s proud.”

“Really?” Tohru looked up now, staring at Uotani. “Do you really think so?”

“I _know_ so.” Uotani chuckled, remembering the crazy, ex-gang-member-turned-doting-mother. There was not a single parent who loved their child like Kyoko loved Tohru. Hell, there was not a person alive who loved anyone as much as Kyoko loved Tohru. “As long as you’re happy, she’d be happy.”

“I am. I am really, really happy.” Tohru turned her hands over, clasping Uotani back.

“And I’m happy and even Hanajima is happy, if not somehow surviving a heat stroke.” Uotani grinned, before slowly untangling herself from Tohru. Reaching back to the table, she grabbed the math sheet once more. “Though we ain’t graduating without actually finishing this.”

“Right…” Tohru’s smiled dropped as she stared at the paper. “I don’t know how to do that.”

Releasing Tohru after a last squeeze, Hanajima flopped backwards onto the ground. She stared at the ceiling blankly. “We could just take an extra year to graduate. Your mom would understand.”

“No, we…” Tohru stared at the paper once more, biting her lip. Reluctantly, she looked away and mumbled, “It still counts, right? A delayed graduation is still graduating.”

“Guys, no. We’re not letting that orange-haired bastard graduate before us,” Uotani vehemently bit out, already picturing Kyo’s smirk. Reaching down, she yanked Hanajima back up into a sitting position. “We just need a little help. And what better help than the resident prince?”

“Yuki!” Tohru brightened immediately and sprang to her feet. “He’s downstairs.”

“Good.” Uotani paused, realizing that they hadn’t heard any earthquakes, mass destruction, or even plain old arguing for the past hour. Mount Kyo-Yuki was set to explode. They’d get nothing done if that happened. “Don’t invite Kyo.”

“Huh?” Already skipping to the door, Tohru immediately halted. Her head cocked one way and then the other before she finally turned around and looked at Uotani in confusion. “Why?”

“Yuki. Kyo. In a room,” Uotani explained slowly, enunciating each word clearly. When it was clear Tohru didn’t get it, she spelled it out. “They’ll fight and we’ll fail a year.” Not to mention. Tohru’s room would probably get destroyed. Cursed by Hanajima or not, Tohru’s room or not, there was no way the pair would be able to handle tutoring each other for a few hours. Not with Kyo’s pride—he’d take offense at the smallest thing.

“Kyo could fail too!” Apparently the only word Tohru heard was _failure_ and she ran out of the room in a panic. “Shigure! Kyo! Yuki!”

“Wait that wasn’t—” It was too late, Uotani could hear Tohru’s shouts as she raced downstairs. Well. There went any hope of a peaceful study session. Uotani glanced at the table once more, at their pile of papers. To be honest, they weren’t getting anything done today anyways. They’d been studying in this room for at least two hours and the only thing they had to show for it was Tohru’s new hairstyle.

“He’ll fail with us,” Hanajima consoled, with such certainty it felt more like a prophecy.

“I don’t know if I should be happy about that or not.” Uotani winced as she heard an angry stomping up the stairs. Turning to Hanajima, she raised a brow. “It’s not too late to burn them all, is it?”


End file.
